Feeding the Missionaries—in the Internet age
As life-long LDS Church members, my wife and I know the drill—how to feed the missionaries. Then, with our son serving an LDS mission, we got an email that changed everything.
You probably know the procedures also. In many wards you sign up for a particular date on the list passed around in Relief Society (if not, you talk with the missionaries and invite them), prepare a meal (perhaps checking first with the missionaries for what they like or for allergies), feed them, listen to their message, try to find friends or acquaintances who they can teach, and pack them off to their teaching appointment for the night.
My son is currently serving an LDS mission in Nevada, and I’m sure that this has happened for him repeatedly. I hope its nearly every night—the sense I have here is that missionaries are fed well in our ward. Like any parent of a missionary, both my wife and I feel an extra obligation to feed the local missionaries. We are also anxious to know how well our son is doing, how he looks and yes, that he is being fed. His email messages are way too short to tell us what we want to know.
It was with those feelings that we got the email message. We didn’t know the family that sent it, and had it not our son’s name in the subject line, it could have easily been trashed as spam. When we opened the message there he was, along with his companion, in a candid photo shot during their dinner appointment with that family. They had fed our son the night before, and taken a few minutes to snap a picture and enquire for email addresses where news might be sent.
For us the photo and note describing our son meant everything. We knew he was well (and fed) and had one additional contact with him and with his work—one more evidence of how he was serving the Lord.
As a result of that message, we now have a new standard for courtesy, one more way to support the missionaries and honor the sacrifice that their families make. When they come to dinner, we take a photo or two, ask the missionaries for email addresses (or physical addressses, when email won’t work) that would welcome the news, and by the next day we send off the photo and a note.
For us, at least, this is the new courtesy. The equivalent of the thank you note you are supposed to send after a dinner, except that in this case we are thanking the missionary’s family for supporting their son or daughter and sacrificing their time with their child in order to serve others.
I won’t be too surprised to learn that this practice is already widespread (I’m not always clued into this kind of practice). I hope it is. But it hadn’t occurred to me, and if I didn’t know, I’m sure there are at least a few who also hadn’t considered this idea. I do know, from personal experience, how much it can mean.
There are also likely other courtesies and helpful gestures we can make to missionaries. I’d love to hear what they are. What else should be part of the courtesies we can extend to missionaries (beyond the obligation we have to help spread the gospel)?
61q, 1.087s
My parents received an email like this when my brother was in boot camp, from a couple in the ward who took him in for sunday dinner. Boot camp is sometimes MORE stringent than the mission about recruits’ contact with their families, so to see a picture of my brother (and the 30 lbs he’d lost) really made everyone’s week. He was one of four Mormons in his squad, and I know having that couple invite them over during the few hours recruits have off really made the whole thing bearable. Just an FYI for any of you that live near basic training sites…
Love it! I hadn’t heard of this idea. As a single woman, I’m not allowed to feed the missionaries :( but I’ll find a way to mention this in Relief Society where it may give others some ideas. I know my parents would have loved it when I was out (had email been available in those prehistoric ’80s, that is).
Very cool idea.
I fear that wonderful opportunities like this are eventually not going to be allowed. Some stick-in-the-mud mission president somewhere will get word of this and decree that it is inappropriate communication. Never underestimate mission president’s capacity for unrighteous dominion (just ask my wife and the pill she had for a prez).
I rather like this idea. My wife and I rarely feed the missionaries in our ward because a) we are in the Primary and rather infrequently see the calendar and b) we tend to be not at home in the evenings. Fortunately, her parents, who live by, have the missionaries over all the time, so I will pass this suggestion on to them!
Ardis, having served in a ward where there were several single sisters, I can assure you that there are ways to feed the missionaries. Usually it involves including one of the priests in the ward, or perhaps the Ward Mission Leader.
Alex, we have no youth in our ward, and I think the WML’s wife would object to what could look to busybodies like a date between her husband and me (and my apartment is too small to seat two missionaries, the WML and wife, and me). I’m supposed to just hand them money to go to McDonald’s.
ardis, my husband is currently deployed, and i cant feed the missionaries either. i saw their bikes near my house a while back. i threw some leftovers (from the dinner i had made that night) along with some cookies and directions in a bag and put it on their handlebars. in our ward in germany when many sisters had husbands deployed, we had a basket that was always at church, and we could put boxes of cereal, or loaves of bread or whatever we wanted in it for them to take home and have.
ten years ago, my companion and i had dinner with a family. he happened to have a webcam and took a picture of us and sent it to our parents. my parents were pretty excited.
The pictures home sound nice, but are our missionaries so ill-prepared or impoverished that they depend on others to nourish them?
We’ve got the elders coming over for dinner on the 17th. Definitely gonna do this. Great idea!
When I was single I used to hang out with the missionaries as often as I could. One act of service that I provided a few times was to help them clean their apartment. The stench of one missionary bathroom was nasty!
My brother is serving in Ohio, and one of the families in the ward sent us a picture. We loved it. My brother is pretty good with sending pictures, but seeing something candid and silly was a fun reminder that he’s still the same guy, and that he’s doing well.
Ardis: in our ward, a married couple will sometime coordinate with a single sister to do dinner together with the missionaries. It works well — and it builds bonds between the marrieds and singles in our ward.
As a gay man, I’m sensitive to appearances as well … so I take the elders in my ward to nice restaurants in the neighborhood. They love it.
I know I loved it when the members in the North Atlanta area sent us e-mail photos of our missionary son. He’s returned now, and his brother is now out. But he’s in Chile, and they’re working hard to activate members, let alone be fed by them, so we don’t get photos that way. But the mission pres is pretty cool. He has a blog, that he updates every three to six weeks with pictures from the mission.
As for us at home… we can never seem to find the camera when the missionaries dine with us.
Oh, as for feeding them… it’s not so much about the skills for them to feed themselves, but about the cost. One way to make the monthly allowance go farther (so they can buy replacement pants/shoes/bike parts) is for members to feed them.
Phouchg (#4): I hope you are wrong. It seems to me like this is unlikely to cause any more problems than the dinner appointment itself.
I don’t think we need to worry too much about it, we certainly shouldn’t stop passing on missionary photos because of this fear.
As a single woman, I’m not allowed to feed the missionaries
Space logistics aside, would you be permitted to feed sister missionaries?
We don’t get to do this feeding thing anymore, as of last week. We can only have them over if we have a non-member there for them to meet/teach. But it does sound like a nice idea.
What a terrific idea!
My wife and I were missionaries some time ago. We have been the missionary parents, too. We’ve been surprised by a couple of mails from somebody that our missionary had made a special impression upon.
We’ve always fed the missionaries. Weekly, without more than one-week breaks for seven years now, 27 months of which we were service missionaries ourselves.
The missionaries bring a special spirit into our home.
15: Sure; there haven’t been any sisters assigned to our stake since I’ve been here, though.
But I’ve been thinkin’ there ought to be ways to modify this that anybody could do. Even a picture of the elders in a classroom or church hallway, or on the street, sent to their parents with a nice note about them could be just about as welcome at home.
That “some time ago” was 1981-83.
A testimonial to feeding the missionaries -
My father is retired. My mother is still working, but is approaching retirement. All of the kids are gone now; the youngest is off his mission and at BYU. The rest of us have settled in four different time zones (we were 5 time zones until recently).
Dad, needing something to do, started feeding the missionaries for lunch — it was too complicated to do dinner with Mom’s teaching schedule. He would cook a nice hot meal and invite some of the other elderly retired high priests from the ward. This has been a standing lunch for several years. It has become the highlight of my father’s week (when his children aren’t visiting).
Mom and Dad don’t “do” Thanksgiving anymore (they go to a resort), but they cook Thanksgiving dinner for the missionaries on the Monday before Thanksgiving. (One year, the missionaries did splits and the companion who got sent away was very mad he missed dinner).
When my brother was on his mission, they upped the ante and were hosting the APs from the mission in their home.
It’s been a tremendous blessing in their lives to feed the missionaries, even though/especially since most of us kids live far away. And missionaries can stand to be spoiled by a grandfather type in the ward…
My personal favorite experience with missionary dinners was with one of our favorite families in the small branch we were in. Because half our area (and half the branch) were more than 45 miles away, we’d often stay at their house overnight to work in their town. A few weeks into our stay, on my companion’s birthday, they invited us over for dinner. When we walked in, my companion sniffed the air and got a strange look on his face. As it turned out, the wife had written to his parents and asked for a recipe for his favorite foods (main dish was sweet and sour chicken)–and not to make me feel left out, had written to my parents and asked about my favorite dessert (apparently at the time it was snickerdoodle cookies). It may have been a small thing, but I guarantee that elder and I both remember it well.
When I was stationed in Tokyo with the Air Force, our servicemen’s branch arranged to have the missionaries within reasonable travel distance come to share Thanksgiving dinner with members of the branch. Back in 1981, getting a dinner of turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, cranberry sauce and cornbread was not something you could do in most Japanese towns, but the military commissaries were stocked with standard American food.
I also remember dinners with the Japanese members, people who sacrificed greatly to put on a feast for us, as an expression of love for the missionaries who had converted them before we arrived. When I was serving my mission in 1969-70, the Yen to dollar exhange rate was so high (360 per dollar, versus 70 per dollar now) that we were living comfortably on $85 a month, when dinner in a restaurant cost only $1.00. We didn’t need to be fed by the member to survive. On the occasions when they invited us, it was an expression of their generosity and kindness, and the best thing we could do was to be grateful in accepting it. And we also did what we could to help with raising money for the branch building fund (like making cookies for a bazaar, or putting on a spook alley).
I have been in missions where the presidents decided to restrict missionary dinners to times when there were investigators present, but the result always was to decrease the members’ contact with the missionaries and their willingness to introduce their nonmember friends. Getting in the habit of spending time with the missionaries gets the kids and the whole family into a missionary mindset. No family home evening just talking about missionary work can be as effective as having the kids meet real missionaries.
H. Bob (22): Great story!
A lot of these ideas come from simply being thoughtful of others. These little things do make a large difference.
#16 – Our Mission Pres. decided the same thing- No missionaries over for dinner unless we had someone for them to teach. Fine. It lasted less than 3 months because those poor missionaries were subsisting on cereal and milk. Trust me, it won’t last long before reason comes back into the Mission Pres.’s mind.
I do love the photo idea.
Now if I could just get the missionaries to stop the monthly shakedown, begging for names of friends and co-workers to teach. Trust me. If I had someone ready to hear the gospel, I promise I wouldn’t hide them from the missionaries. Meanwhile, I respect my friends right to be Baptist, Hindi, Muslim, Catholic, etc. and will not be obnoxious to them about my religion.
We’ve had the “no missionaries unless a non-member present” for years. No sign of changing, although this year it did expand to include less-actives.
My mission had the rule that you could only have two dinner appointments a week unless an investigator was present. I don’t know how long the rule lasted, but it was still quite alive and kicking when I finished and it started when I’d been out just a few months. Anyway, that’s sort of a compromise on the none vs all. Actually, it was kind of a bummer. I’d enjoyed getting to know the members that way.
Being a single female, it requires a bit of logistic creativity to feed the missionaries now. (There’re only ever elders here. Too dangerous for sisters, I’m told.)
I’m a single female. I feed the elders all the time. I simply invite a young married couple — there are plenty in our ward, to also come so there is an adult male _chaperone_ present. It is a double bonus because I get to know the couple and support the missionaries.
Ardis, a couple times on my mission we had a single sister bring us food that she had already cooked — no alone time, and the missionaries get fed…
#21 – I had one area in my mission where the couple was semi-retired but never home in the evenings. So they fed us breakfast once a week, every week, until a well-meaning but uninformed new missionary felt that it was inappropriate to miss companionship study to eat with the members. (The APs had given permission to do so.) Rather than asking anyone about it, he went straight to the MP, who said that we shouldn’t be doing it every week.
The members then called him and very lovingly explained that they rather liked having the missionaries come to their home and share messages and encouragement. And the weekly breakfast resumed.
Speaking of the internet age, I was serving while there was still the transition into missionaries using email. I was in a car accident (nobody hurt) and some members emailed my family to let them know about it. Unfortunately, the email didn’t arrive, and it caused quite a bit of concern when I mentioned it in an off-handed way in my next letter but, hey, it is the thought that counts, right?
Ardis, When I was the ward mission leader in my ward, we always found a way for the single sisters to feed the missionaries. We had one sister who would drop off food at their apartment and I was always willing to sacrifice myself or someone else to be present during dinner so as to have a third male in the room.
Kent, I like the idea of sending a picture along with a note. Never heard of it being done until now, but I do like it.
I’m glad so many other people are able to work around the stupid rule about single women and missionaries — even if it means you have to pay for and prepare dinner for multiple other people in order to help the missionaries, or take dinner to someone else’s house rather than having the elders visit your own home, and all the other suggestions. None of them work in my circumstances.
What Ardis is too nice to say is that it’s incredibly insulting to be considered too dangerous to actually have the missionaries enjoy your company, but to nonetheless be expected to perform the duties of the host. It’s not that there aren’t practical solutions to the problem, it’s that it’s offensive to be considered a “problem.”
I agree with Kristine and think all single ladies are off the hook. There are many ways to serve in the church and there should be no expectation to jump through extra hoops just for protocol. The missionaries can be fed by families.
Kristine- you’re so darn seductive, I’m pretty sure you shouldn’t even be in the same room as missionaries- ever! I think that just excused you from an awful lot of things. Personally, I’ll never understand how having a third man in the room makes anything “safer”. I’ve never felt like feeding the missionaries was an obligation, but it is probably nice. After all, if we hadn’t had dinner appointments on my mission, we really wouldn’t have had any appointments at all, and that makes for really long days.
#8 said: “The pictures home sound nice, but are our missionaries so ill-prepared or impoverished that they depend on others to nourish them?” Depending on others to nourish our missionaries is a long-standing practice in the mission field. As a former mission mom, I taught our missionaries to cherish the time spent each day (1 hour — no more) in a member’s home. In Brazil, the noon meal was sometimes the only nourishing meal our missionaries had. “Ill-prepared?” No, but to go back home just to cook a hot meal could take hours because of the distances involved. “Impoverished?” Yes, and you would be too if you had to buy your main meal every day. Our missionaries were not there to ‘troll’ for converts, but to offer encouragement to the members. The members also offered encouragement to the missionaries when the doors slammed shut, and the dogs jumped the fences.
very nice. My Dad isn’t a member of the Church, my younger brother is serving in a western state. Recently on the day of my Dad’s birthday, my family was touched: the family who had my brother over for dinner that night called my Dad to say Happy Birthday on behalf of my brother!
Like Ardis, I am single, I end up dropping stuff off. Sometimes people say they will invite me over so I can help provide a meal and meet the missionaries, but it doesn’t happen.So I do feel I am not in the missionary loop that those w/families get. I do find the rules a frustration- most of us single females are decent folks who are not the type of sis who led to the formation of such rules.
#8: in our area, a large metro area in the US, the monthly allottment granted to the missionaries is actually based on the expectation of one member-provided meal per day. Thus w/the “universal system” of supporting the missionaries throughout the world (ie all gernally pay the same to serve), more money is available to those who serve in more costly areas such as Japan and/or those from very poor third world areas, who would otherwise be unable to serve. So it is important that members strive to provide this one daily meal.
Our missionary sons told us the same thing as what #38 expressed. They served in expensive areas and were so grateful for being fed by local families. Some of those member-missionary contacts have led to life-long friendships for our sons. Since my husband is rarely home before 6:30 or 7:00, and I have some challenging health problems that cause me to be unreliable about signing up for a certain day, I asked our sons for alternative meal ideas. These are a few:
1. sign up on the calendar, explain to the missionaries that we will be ordering pizza for them and ask their preferences, then order, pay for the pizza, and have it delivered to their apartment.
2. buy a gift card for a restaurant or even fast-food place and give that to the missionaries.
3. give the missionaries a meal that you have prepared and frozen, like chili, soup, or a casserole, which they can use on a night that is open
4. load up a bag or two of staples that they use, and which they personally pay for, such as paper plates, paper towels, toilet paper, a pancake mix, loaf of bread, hot chocolate, bath soap, laundry soap, etc. I like to include cookies, a bag of snacks, etc. Your imagination is the limit….
An older, widowed friend of mine has come up with a great solution. She teams up with different friends whose husbands are out of town, deployed, etc. to provide the meal for the missionaries.
I love the idea of the picture; several families did that for us, and others wrote, e-mailed, etc. I have a long-time friend who e-mailed me news about my youngest son while he was in her area, and we formed a wonderful relationship between the two of us. Finally got to meet her a couple of years ago!!
Our youngest son served in Scotland, and the members were so kind! We were thrilled as, over the course of his mission, we received a letter or email- one sister even drew a beautiful portrait of each missionary and sent it .
My favorite story is of his arrival, though. He left on Dec 23rd from Canada, arriving in England for the MTC there. I was thrilled he was going and in the right place etc, but wondering how he did arriving, and worried about his first Christmas, and on top of that my Dad had had a stroke the very morning we were seeing our son off at the airport, so i was anxious to let him know how his grandfather was doing, worried that he would be worried and so on.
The internet and Mom’s came to the rescue! A casual friend in the ward lived in england, so I asked if she might have a friend that I could get word to my son via email. My plan was to email a letter to England for somwone to print off and post for me so that my son might hear news sooner. She did indeed have a friend who lived near the MTC, and this sister kindly agreed to receive my email. But she didn’t mail it.
Instead, she printed it off, put it in an envelope and hand delivered it to the MTC, exacting a promise from the MTC that my son would receive it asap. Then she did something more.
As I read her email that night, it brought tears and calm. This dear sister had no idea what my son looked like, so she walked through the building and looked in every classroom. She wrote to report that she saw all the missionaries, and though she did not know my son, they all seemed well, so she assured me that he likely was. It was a very stressful time and her thoughtfulness was both touching and comforting.
I have written a few letters or emails) over the years to parents of missionaries when I felt touched by them, or particularly impressed.
However it wasn’t until I was a missionary Mom that I learned that the only thing parents of a missionary like better than hearing FROM their missionary is hearing ABOUT their missionary.
Catherine
In terms of little courtesies, I try to dry clean the elders suits from time to time- this is an area they tend to neglect and is quite costly for their budget. I know a sister who irons the elders shirts for them so they look their best- a good idea since many of the boys don’t feel that they have the time to iron at all.
I sent my sons on their missions with a variety of OTC meds for colds, headache, stomach upset etc as they are costly and inconvenient to acquire sometimes. I got letters from both expressing great relief and gratitude that they had these on hand when struggling with minor ailments, so I try to notice if my local missionaries are battling a cold, and if so, load them up with Vitamin C and whatever else is appropriate when I see them.
On hot summer days I invite them to go ‘wash-up for dinner’ and tell them I have laid out a facecloth, soap and a hand towel for each of them in the bathroom, to wash their faces and clean off the heat of the day. Many have commented how much better and refreshed they felt just from washing off their sweaty face.
As a former missionary Mom, I also think we have an obligation to prepare our children in terms of courtesies. My boys were encouraged to write a brief note of thanks for the meal whenever possible, and I sent them with Thank-you cards and extra money for postage. My feeling is that everyone likes to be appreciated, and I wanted them to express their gratitude and be mindful that members often make a sacrifice, be it time or money, to serve up a nice dinner to the missionaries.
We had one set of elders who folded plain white paper, origami style, to look like a mans dress shirt.
They would carry these as sort of a calling card, just write a brief 2-3 sentence “Thank-you” and leave it where the member would find it later. Both charming and clever.
#8 John, I think there is greater purpose to us feeding the missionaries than simply making it financially viable for them to go on a mission by supporting them with food.
Having missionaries in our homes gives us a chance to get to know them, and I think that members who know and feel comfortable with their missionaries are more likely to introduce them to their friends. After all, entrusting our friends, the friendship we have with them, and the risk of them being put off by the missionaries is a big deal. When we know, love and trust our missionaries, I think we are more likely to introduce them to others.
It also gives us a chance to serve them when they spend every day giving their all.
Finally, I think they benefit from the chance to anchor and connect with members daily, especially at a family meal, and that it has a renewing effect on them to feel the ‘normalcy’ of it amidst what are often difficult and demanding days.
My son has been in the Texas Houston East Mission for a whole 7 days!! All day Sunday I thought about him and wondered where he was eating dinner. I missed him so much and was hoping and praying that he was somewhere safe & comfortable, and being well taken care of. I can only hope that there are good people watching over my son while he is away—-and I in turn, can watch over someone else’s son for them. Thanks for sharing such a great idea of taking a picture and sending it home °Ü°
My husband and I both served missions. We know what it is like from the stand point of both missionary and the family. We served in the age where we didn’t have internet access like now. So we make an effort to really get to know our missionaries, feed them often, and if possible take pictures and either e-mail or add the missionary’s family to our facebook friend list. One elder was in our ward for nearly a year. He also wasn’t very good at sending home pictures. Once they stopped by and I started to log off the computer as my husband let them in. The elder saw I was on facebook and had me add him as a friend. His sister was keeping up with his account while he was gone. That’s when we started doing that for others as well. Due to the long time he was in the ward, I was able to post pictures and updates from holidays, ward gatherings, when they celebrated my birthday and mother’s day in our home, and I was able to find out from his sister what his favorite dessert was to surprise him when we signed up to feed both sets of missionaries on his birthday. His family was extremely grateful for the extra updates, esp his mom who loves to do birthdays special and wondered what she could do that year for him.
One fun tradition we started that year was inviting the missionaries over to help decorate our Christmas tree. The elders heard we had our tree up but hadn’t decorated it and asked if they could help us. We said sure. It was fun evening and so we did it again this year. One elder had never had a tree before and loved all our special ornaments. So we bought him one to remember that night when he was transferred. We also did a 12 days of Christmas scripture chain. We set it up with them to come over and participate in a few of the readings as we went along. We didn’t do either one this year and there was a noticeable difference in the spirit in our home from not having the missionaries stop by as often during the Christmas season.
My wife & I go to a Spanish Branch but we live outside the boudaries of the 4 companionships that serve in our branch. So my wife will sign up for a Sunday meal & bring something to feed all of them after the 3hr block – that we can heat up in the kitchen @ the church. This can work for single sisters too.
Thank you for your lovely stories! I currently have a missionary in New Jersey. I have often received a phone call or email from people in my son’s mission telling me what a fine young man he is. I am sooo grateful for those mom’s in New Jersey who are taking care of my son. It is such a blessing and a joy for me to hear from members who have had him in their home! They have fed him so much that even with his bike riding and regular morning exercise, he has gained weight! He has expressed love and appreciation for these members as do I. Thank you New Jersey mom’s for watching over my son! :)
I love this idea. When my son was out, he would send home lots of pictures. One time a family in his area hosted a birthday party for him, and they took lots of pictures! He was in Argentina, and most of the families did not have email or speak English!
Ardis, you could ask your WML and his family to join you in feeding the missionaries, and feed them at the meetinghouse! I knew a lovely older sister who would feed them at the meetinghouse about once a month, since she actually lived outside the ward boundaries.
I haven’t had the missionaries over for a meal in a few years, due to my being home alone in the evenings. I need to get busy and invite them for an early dinner (like at noon)! I miss having them over.
I think Kent’s OP is great, and he’s given me an idea or two that even in my peculiar circumstances might aid missionaries and their families. But I wish I had never chimed in. People, please stop “solving the problem” for me. None of your suggestions are practical for a sister who, in addition to being single, has an apartment too small for more than four people to dine together (do you think I should stand in the background and be a waitress for the missionaries and however many other people you think need to be there?); on a tight budget (I should feed multiple other appetites in order to serve the missionaries?); is on foot (ever try to carry a hot meal for the missionaries and the family of the WML whom you think I should also feed — on foot? ever try to carry even the weight of a cold meal as far as I have to walk to get to church?), and on top of that I get to be the poster child for Kristine’s militant feminism? There are other difficulties that you’re not aware of in your certainty that my life must be exactly like yours. Please stop. At least stop directing comments at me by name.
Ah, yes, Ardis–that’s me. Militant feminist ward missionary–sorry I stepped on your toes.
We obviously can’t see all of the facets of any other person’s life; and all of us, to one extent or other, lead lives of quiet desperation.
I do know for certain that any policy which keeps Ardis from feeding the missionaries is a policy that impoverishes our community, however unintentionally. And that I’d be honored to have dinner, or lunch, or whatever, with Ardis, any time. Seriously, who wouldn’t?
In fact, next time I’m in Salt Lake, let’s grab lunch. My treat. Preferably at someplace that has fry sauce. :)
Kristine, you can’t hide behind your being a ward missionary. Fact is, you snagged my extremely mild comment, used it as the excuse to launch another round in the Big Bad Patriarchy Oppresses Women war, and did it without any real thought (or consideration, if you did think) to whether that’s really what I meant by my use of the word “stupid,” or that I might not like being the excuse for another in-your-face tirade.
Step on my toes (you’re good at that), fine, but please don’t use me as a club to beat your war drums.
When I was a missionary we didn’t have these restrictive rules. If for instance you tracted out a housewife who was willing to let you in and teach her a lesson, you went in and taught her a lesson. I think the theory was that as long as you were together you constituted a chaperone for each other. We sometimes had dinner appointments with single sisters; in fact we had Thanksgiving with one (old enough to be our mom) one year. I understand why the Church has clamped down on this, but it sure sounds to me like it makes missionary life a lot harder and more complicated than I remember it being.
Ardis, I’ve apologized. And you’ve misrepresented me. I reckon we’re even.
Kevin, it is different in every mission, I think. In the Philippines, our mission president was fine with dining with single sisters, but some members or elders from other missions brought their home town rules (or mission rules) with them. Also, previous mission presidents had different rules.
My point was more to the fact that I got home in 2002, so I think this isn’t a then vs. now type of issue.
If any extra-zealous missionaries glance over the member’s shoulder at the computer screen and see any website other than lds.org or myldsmail.net, they’ll lose the Spirit for the rest of the entire week. It’s therefore probably best if the members wait until the missionaries have left the house before sending the e-mail.
We sent pix from Thanksgiving (6 Elders in total), to their families, and I did not hear back from a single family, nothing.
They must have dismissed it as spam…
We still love the Elders, though.
Zone Leader (55), I hope you are being a bit sarcastic. I suspect most missionaries see worse things on billboards than they would see by accident on the computer screens of most members.
Karl (56), that is simply bad manners on the part of the Elders’ families. We responded with a thank you, and it seems to me common courtesy that a missionary parent respond with a thank you. Please don’t let their lack of courtesy stop you. [And remember it could also have been a bad email address or just that the parents don't really use email much.]
there are three reasons for the “single sister” rule as I understand it. 1 To protect the reputation of the missionaries. 2. To protect the reputation of the Sister. 3. To protect the reputation of the church. There is never a suggestion that the sister is “dangerous”, only that gossip (even though unfounded) can be hurtful for all involved. It’s a shame that these rules are required, but personally I feel they are needed.
My husband and I are serving on a mission at this time. We try to have the local missionaries occasionally. Several times we have had six at once, usually it is four, sometimes two. We had four over on Sunday, for a late meal after they had attended a meeting. My husband ran across this site that same day and read it to me. The missionaries had not yet arrived and I went right in and got the camera. After dinner, when the Elders usually give a spiritual message, this time I read the story about the pictures and email addresses and said “Okay Elders, I need email addresses”. They were so excited and wanted to take a couple more pictures. We did take a few more picures with all of us in them. Now I need to go write a note to all those parents and get the pictures sent. I would have loved to receive something like that when our kids or grandkids were on missions. Now it is us on a mission (our second one). So while I am at it, I am going to send the pictures to our family too. I am the Mission President’s Secretary and my husband takes care of the cars, apartments, finances, etc. Oh, forgot to mention, it was Valentine’s Day and the missionaries had brought us a velvet rose and a beautiful (dollar store) Valentine. I mention the dollar store, because that is the place that helps them make it to the end of the month.
Bless you, Lois. This was exactly what I hoped for when I wrote this post.